Oenean Mages
There are many schools of magic practiced on Oenus, and they each have their own way of practicing magic. The common thread among them is that they each draw power from two sources - themselves, and some outside source unique to each school. The schools are Mabene, Aelkot, Labur, Wydal, Amalat, Sarsen, Krasov, and Coeseruk. The Schools of Magic Mabene The island of Mabene is home to the oldest currently practiced arcane tradition. The Mages of Mabene practice a method of gathering magical energy from the surrounding space. A Mabene mage provides just enough personal magical energy to guide their spells To cast a spell, a Mabene mage must collect most of the magical energy from the surrounding landscape and give it purpose using a small amount of self-provided magical effort. Mabene mages are at their best when they cast their spells very slowly. It is necessary for them to draw their energy in from the surrounding space and only a small amount of that is ‘ready to go’ and easily accessible. Gathering the magic of an area can deplete it. Doing so does not create permanent damage. The distribution of the stray magical energy that the Mabene mages use is not uniform. High density areas are often fought over by the most powerful Mabene mages. Commonly a mage will build a tower or some other high structure that allows them to see a larger area. This makes it easier to gather the energy they need. The Mabene tradition is considered by many to be 'finished' in that there are few open questions that are left outside the most fundamental theories of magic. Such studies border more on the realm of theology than wizardry and some of the fields with more active research think of the Mabene mages as old stooges who like to throw magic around for personal gain. Aelkot An offshoot of the Mabene tradition on the continent of Aelkot. These mages are rivals of the Mabene and use the same methods. The Aelkot mages are well organized and decently unified, using a combination of democratic ideals and bidding for use of the magical power of an area. They tend to delve deeply into a particular field of study and master a small set of spells. Bartering their skills at a particular type of magic to help the community in exchange for the service of their peers and the use of the magical towers of Aelkot for their personal spellcasting. Labur The city of Labur is home to the society of mages bearing the same name. They are poorly understood and not well liked by the common people, even in the city of Labur, due to the use of 'evil practices' mostly in the form of bloodletting to power their spells. The Labur tradition is built from the Elven practice of magic used before the fall of the Old Dominion. This also does not do many good things to endear them to the common people. A Labur mage powers their spells by capturing magical energy as a living thing transitions to death. About a thousand years ago Labur mages learned to use their own vitality to power most of their spells but this has done little to improve public opinion. When casting large spells, when in poor health, or when performing many castings a Labur mage may need to resort to some kind of sacrifice. Rumor would have it that these sacrifices are human but only the wicked would do such a thing. Most Labur mages find it to be more ethical and usually sufficient to use plants for their sacrifices. Wydal The Labur and Mabene are the oldest arcane traditions on Oenus. The Wydal tradition is the union of both of those traditions from the earliest days of exchange between them. A Wydal mage collects life energy from the area around them to power their spells. This is slower than a Labur sacrifice but faster than the Mabene technique of gathering. Wydal mages are often sought after in times of war because their techniques are of great use on the battlefield where the unfortunate death of soldiers can power their spells. In times of peace they face many of the same prejudices of the Labur mages mostly due to a misunderstanding of how their powers work. The Wydal tradition requires the most 'natural talent' of them all and their magic has few large scale applications off the battlefield. Mages of this kind are rare. Amalat The Amalat tradition of magecraft is headquartered on the Island of Amalat. This is a land ravaged by having a particularly weak barrier between it and the Outer Planes. Mabene mages settled the island in spite of the danger of living there in order to study and the Amalat tradition grew out of their studies. The Amalat mages power their magic by creating vibrations in the local plane. This is a relatively difficult process requiring more personal expenditure of energy than most spellcasting methods. The payoff is that a skilled Amalat mage, in a favorable location, can create resonance between the plane they are on and the another plane, creating more powerful effects through resonance. Amalat mages are a loose organization with little order among them. They are competitive only for locations with a particular value for casting certain types of spells. The practices of Amalat magecraft can create wide ranging consequences on the local environment as features of the planes being manipulated begin to influence the landscape, people, and things in the areas affected by the resonance. Sarsen The Sarsen mages started as observers of the natural world. Witnessing the magic available naturally to many wondrous beasts and some sentient beings, some Labur mages theorized that it would be possible to determine what aspects of those beasts allowed them to create these magical effects without a need for some kind of magical power source and reproduce it. Sarsen mages undergo dangerous rituals to implant themselves with specially prepared tissue and fluid cultures to gain powers. Most of these cultures are natural in origin but most research is directed towards the creation of the cultures artificially through alchemical means. Most people do not find a Sarsen mage to be disagreeable until it is understood what a Sarsen mage does. This is because the Sarsen mages do not create negative effects on the surrounding land and people, do not obviously practice blood magic and do not have a history of manipulating kingdoms for personal gain. Krasov In principle the Krasov mages do magic the same way that the Mabene mages do- energy from the surrounding space is collected and woven into spells. The Krasov mages use large magical collectors to gather energy over long periods of time and store it for use in spells. This allows them to cast spells much faster than a Mabene mage without risk of depleting the area, but the collectors build energy slowly and are a constant drain on the surrounding environment. While a Krasov mage might be able to cast several spells quicker than a Mabene mage if they have a well charged collector if they need to wait to charge their collector the Mabene method is much faster. Powerful collectors are large and difficult to move. The Krasov mages are highly territorial both among themselves and with the Mabene. Coeseruk Coeseruk mages owe their tradition to Sarsen mages who sought to improve those techniques by using magical collectors in the Krasov style to avoid the substantial dangers of implanting magical cultures into their bodies. The Coeseruk use tattoos and much safer implanted devices to allow them to absorb the magical qualities of things found in the natural world. This saves them from considerable risk but does not grant the permanent powers of the Sarsen mages. Many people find Coeseruk mages to be unsettling in appearance due to the prominent tattoos and deformations of their bodies due to surgery. Their mortality rate is much lower than the Sarsens. Syncretist Those who blend methods are known as syncretists. They are generally not well respected because their contributions to the study of magecraft tend to be rare.